The ancient skill of drying your food for storage is constantly being re-discovered and modified, and these days, there is a wealth of knowledge on the web (grab it while you can!) and locally (in many areas).

The biggest modifications came once we learned about germs, as realized that there are safe and unsafe ways to dry foods (especially meat and fish). The most important to watch is temperature and humidity. If you leave foods between 40 deg F (20 deg C) and 130 deg F, you will get dangerous bacteria. (for meat, it must be above 145 deg F). If you have too much humidity, the food will rot rather than dry out. So - learn how to dry safely! This is "Play It Safe With Food":

http://www.nifa.usda.gov/nea/food/pdfs/hhs_facts_safefood.pdf

There are a number of very good pamphlets available from the USDA Extension service.

http://nchfp.uga.edu/how/dry.html

This covers dehydrators, fruit & vegetables, herbs, jerky... the whole nine yards! Free to read the information online - can't get a better deal. :-)

If you want a really good book, look for "So Easy to Preserve", 5th ed. 2006. Bulletin 989, Cooperative Extension Service, The University of Georgia, Athens. Revised by Elizabeth L. Andress. Ph.D. and Judy A. Harrison, Ph.D., Extension Foods Specialists.

After you understand the basic process for safe drying, you may want to build your own passive solar dryer. (Even those of us in the Pacific Northwest have some days when we can dry outside).

Here is a wonderful homemade dehydrator by Risa Bear (a skilled Green Wizard from Oregon - I highly recommend her blog):
http://risashome.blogspot.com/2009/12/just-like-summer.html

And this is her YouTube video about it:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XnI6EPvpN28

There are several other good videos on YouTube about construction and maintenance of dehydrators.

A very cute 1-minute animated summary:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oqOMgKZD8oQ

This one shows you how to recycle old soda and beer cans into a great solar dehydrator:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7B2DGXPOk4Q